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Monday, February 21, 2011

Make Your Own Fruit Roll Ups


I know! I too was surprised that you could make your own fruit roll ups with ease! I stumbled upon (literally, stumbledupon.com'd) this recipe.

I'll tell you right now, Shania makes it look easy. And simple. And kind of beautiful.

And these are just fruit roll ups. It shouldn't be so intriguing.

And yet, I found myself buying an insane amount of fruit and rolling out the parchment paper to make them.

Now, this blog is called "Clutzy Cooking" for a reason. Namely that I am a complete mess sometimes. And this recipe, this was one of those times. I covered myself, my counters, and my beautiful new food processor (which was, by the way, the best gift ever!!), in pink goo.

Sticky pink goo. Sticky pink goo that stains.

My OCD personality was seriously disturbed by this entire fiasco but, once everything was cleaned up and the cookie sheets were in the oven, I was back to optimistic about my results.

Well, oops.

My oven doesn't have the low settings this recipe calls for in order to dehydrate the fruit puree. You need to set your oven to 150-180 and allow it to bake in the warmth all day. My oven had two settings, "WM" which I am guessing means "warm" and "200" which was past the maximum temperature of 180 by rather a lot.

I decided to set it between the two. Needle middling between "WM" and "200".

Allow me to be the expert to tell you that doing this will cause you to burn your fruit roll ups at the 4 hour mark. Which is about half as long as they are supposed to bake.

See how my roll ups didn't exactly roll right? That's because they got too stiff and burnt. Breaking into brittle shards in some places.

FAIL.

My friends still loved them though, even if I couldn't face the food failure. They even took leftovers home! So, for those of you who know how to follow recipes (which I don't apparently) and who won't make a mess (which I always do), you should try this out! The idea is extremely fun and, when executed correctly, a smashing success. Which is the reason I decided to post them, even if mine are less than ideal. Well, and the fact that my friends were begging for the recipe. Funny sometimes how even what we see as huge flops, other people find little victories in :)

Make & Enjoy <3


Rolled Fruit Leather

4 cups fruit (apples, pears, peaches, apricots)
1/2 cup water
1 tablespoon honey or agave syrup  (optional)
1 teaspoon lemon juice
Peel and dice the fruit, removing all seeds (unless you’re using berries, like I was. Then, don't be crazy. Keep the seeds). Add diced fruit and water to a stockpot and bring to a boil. Add in lemon juice and honey. Reduce heat to medium-low and continue cooking until fruit is cooked through and can easily be mashed. Using a stick blender or carefully pouring the cooked fruit into a stand blender/processor, puree the fruit until smooth. On a parchment-lined cookie sheet or dehydrator tray, thinly spread out the puree between 1/8″ and 1/4″ thick. Bake at the lowest oven temperature (150-180 degrees F) for 8-10 hours or according to the manufacturer’s directions in your dehydrator. Fruit should not be sticky enough to stick to you and grab on when touched. Remove cookie sheets from oven and allow to cool slightly. Roll up from one end to the other depending on the kinds of rolls you’d like. For Fruit-By-the-Foot-style rolls, roll from short end to short end and cut 1″ pieces off the roll. For Fruit Roll-Up-style rolls, roll the long end and cut 3-4″ rolls off the large roll.
This recipe is fun and should be treated as such! But if you're a clutz like me, just be careful. You don't want your treats to turn out more leather then fruit and more mess then fun like mine did.

*UPDATE* So, while I am not anxious to try this again, I found this cooking blog with a great tutorial on how to make fruit leather roll ups and maybe NOT be a disaster like me. For all of you looking, I encourage checking it out and maybe deciding on a batch modified between her recipe and the one I shared here. Thanks for commenting, all of you, and making me feel less like a foodie flop! You are all lovely people :)


27 comments:

  1. Such a great idea for the kids, but I am sure it could turn into a "sticky" situation! Blessings, Cstherine

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  2. I think they look great! I wonder if my oven goes below 200 though! Something I'll have to check before trying this out!

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  3. For sure going to try this! Thanks for sharing!

    ~Jess @ www.makingoverthemartins.blogspot.com

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  4. I'm going to have to try these out. Thanks so much for stopping by my blog so that I could come check out yours. I am loving your recipes and I'm following you now. Have a great day.
    Katie

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  5. Thanks for visiting my blog. This looks like fun; my boys will love them.

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  6. love the natural fruit rollups so much better for you than the alternative thanks for sharing your recipe

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  7. Gosh, don't you hate when a project doesn't go perfectly? I bet these were still yummy...I know my boys would try a shard or two or three! Fun to find your blog :)

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  8. thanks for stopping by my blog -- so fun to find new ones! ok, here's my beef with these things ... i tried them twice last year and could never get them to work for me! oh i was so irritated because it used so much fruit = waste of money. now, if mine had turned out as beautiful as yours, these would be a regular in my house! you may call yourself clutzy but you did a mighty fine job with these!!

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  9. Regardless of how long any of us are cooking, Meaghan, we're all still learning. Many is the great recipe that began with someone having an idea, trying it, giving it a taste, and saying, "this didn't come out right." That's the great thing about the cooking-blog community: we all learn together. I think what you're doing is great, and your blog, from its concept to its design, is terrific. I'm so glad you came to my cooking blog, so that I was able to know about yours! I'm your new follower, and am looking forward to visiting you often.

    Ben
    http://kissthecook-ben.blogspot.com/

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  10. I'm pretty sure my experience would closely resemble yours! They look awesome however :) Thanks for visiting, I'm following back. I just looked at a food dehydrator at csn today...decided they were too expensive, but this makes me want to take a second look!

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  11. What a great idea. I am trying to be a little more healthy, these would be great. I'll have to see how low my oven goes? Not sure?

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  12. This is so cool! I had no idea you could make fruit roll-ups...I'm trying this. :)
    Thanks for sharing and thanks for following my blog! I'm following you now too, can't wait to share recipes.

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  13. That sounds like fun, I'm quite sure mine wouldn't come out right either but it would be fun to try and I'll bet the kids would have a blast! Thanks!

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  14. I want to try this one! Thanks so much for stopping by my site, I am following you now. I love finding new blogs.

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  15. thanks for sharing your adventures, i can really relate to the clutzy cooking, although most of my kitchen blunders have to deal with candy. thanks for commenting on my blog, it was great to find yours!

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  16. I am a kitchen clutz too! I sometimes wonder why I like to cook so much when I seem so helpless in the kitchen at times! I have also attempted to make these and had trouble with the oven, so I can completely relate! The edges started to burn (or at least I thought they were burning) so I took them out only to find that the 'burned' parts were just about perfect and the entire middle portion was undone. sigh!

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  17. COOL. they don't have these in the nethlerlands... and i do miss them - so it's nice to see a recipe for them... accidents happen right? if you can make them, i bet i can too :)

    p.s. thanks for visiting my blog - i'll follow back :) more fun this way!

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  18. This is something I have wanted to make ever since we got out new oven - it has a dehydration setting, perfect for this! It's a matter of keeping the oven out of commission for a while as these 'bake' up! Delicious!

    Thanks for stopping by my blog! Hope you'll be back, I know I will be returning to yours!

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  19. Okay, seriously?! You are a genius! My kids would LOVE this!!!!

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  20. I was so excited about this recipe, but I'd have the same issue, too hot of an oven.

    And I just got my first food processor for Christmas and I can't believe I lived without one so long!

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  21. Oh my gosh, I've GOT to try this one! Thanks so much for sharing!!

    Love to have you link up to my new link party, For the Kids Fridays!
    http://sunscholars.blogspot.com
    :)rachel

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  22. Thanks for posting even though it didn't work out so well! Fruit roll ups are my favorite fruit snack, that would be awesome to make them at home!

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  23. I featured this post on my blog today. You can find it here:
    http://sunscholars.blogspot.com/2011/03/scholarly-inspirations.html

    You can grab a featured button from my side-bar if you'd like to post it on your site.

    Thanks for such a fun idea!!
    :)rachel from SunScholars.blogspot.com

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  24. I too failed epically on my first attempt at making fruit roll ups. At least yours were somewhat edible, as mine were adhered to the parchment paper. (How does that even happen!?!) Thanks for sharing, and I think you've inspired me to give it another go!

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  25. Hey peeps...toaster ovens, anyone? I haven't tried them and I'm not sure they'll work...but they might. Thanks so much for the recipe...these are always expensive but from the rest of the comments, now I know why!

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    Replies
    1. ha, yeah, they are kind of a pain to make so. best of luck! hope you have better results than i did :P

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